1. Field of the Invention
The present invention pertains to a sorter, and more particularly to a sorter that sorts paper ejected from a copying machine or printer into multiple bins.
2. Description of the Related Art
Various sorters that sort, in page order or by original, paper on which an image has been formed have been developed in recent years as options for image forming apparatuses such as electrophotographic copying machines and laser printers. As sorters of this type, those which move up and down as a single unit multiple sorting bins comprising a bin assembly for the sorting of paper are common.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,709,915 discloses a sorter having a paper exit for non-sorting and a paper exit for sorting, in which the uppermost bin is used as the non-sorting bin and the second and lower bins are used as sorting bins.
In said sorter, however, because the non-sorting bin and sorting bins are moved together as one unit and there are two paper exits, in either sort mode or non-sort mode it is necessary to move the bin to which paper is to be ejected from the standby position to an applicable paper exit before the first sheet on which an image is formed is ejected, and therefore some time is necessary before the first sheet may be ejected. In order to resolve this problem, the non-sorting bin can be fixed to the upper area of the sorter main unit. However, this construction limits the range in which the sorting bins may be moved, such that the number of sorting bins that may be installed is reduced, or such that the non-sorting bin protrudes at the upper area of the sorter main unit, which makes the sorter large in size.